Villanova Beats Providence to win Big East Championship

New York: The two best teams in the Big East conference did battle to determine who would be the kings of the Conference, as the Villanova Wildcats took on Providence Friars from Madison Square Garden in New York on Saturday night. Villanova made the Championship by taking down Butler while Providence knocked out number 1 seeded Xavier in the semifinals

Villanova would open the scoring on a basket from Jalen Brunson for a 2-0 lead Providence would tie the game on a basket from Kalif Young. Villanova would open up a nine-point lead at 11-2 with 15:05 left, but Providence would go on a run which saw them tie the game on two separate occasions, with the last one being 23-23 with 4:22 left in first half, the three-pointers would help the Wildcats increase the lead as they would take a 31-27 lead into halftime.

Villanova opened the second half scoring with Jalen Brunson scoring the first 5 points, as Providence was trying to keep this game close. Villanova would lead by 12, at 45-33, with 14:42 left. Providence tied the game at 51 on a basket and foul with 7:49 left. Villanova would retake the lead on a basket from Mikal Bridges. Brunson would tie the game at 60 with 29 seconds left, Providence had tried to shoot to win at the buzzer, but it came up short and the game headed into overtime tied at 60.

Bridges hit a three to open the scoring for Villanova in overtime and the Wildcats would just take it to Providence as they would go on to take down Providence 76-66 to win the 2018 Big East Championship, in front of a sellout crowd of 19,818 and Villanova’s Mikal Bridges was named MVP of the tournament. This is Villanova third Big East Championship in 4 years (2015, 2017 & 2018).

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